<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Things that break and burn by Eledhwen</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24473317">Things that break and burn</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eledhwen/pseuds/Eledhwen'>Eledhwen</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Fratt Week 2020 [5]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Daredevil (TV), The Punisher (TV 2017)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Almost a drabble, Character Study, Fire, Fratt Week 2020, Gen, Introspection, bone</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-05-31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-05-31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 07:53:48</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>342</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24473317</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eledhwen/pseuds/Eledhwen</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>For the last two Frattweek prompts, 'bone' and 'fire': a couple of short character studies.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Fratt Week 2020 [5]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1759558</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Fratt Week</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Things that break and burn</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I ran out of time and inspiration and have ended up using today's amnesty day to produce the shortest piece ever combining two prompts. Oops. </p>
<p>I've enjoyed the Frattweek challenge! Hope you've enjoyed the product of it.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Frank Castle, Matt thinks as he perches on the roof of the cemetery chapel and listens to the sound of the ambulances and police cars taking him away, is like bone. He’s hard, and strong, and yet he can break.</p>
<p>He’s just broken now, just because the pressure and pain of the night caused him to snap. He’s broken, remembering his family, and brittle with it; defensive and hurting and angry.</p>
<p>Matt knows how he feels. God knows he’s felt that way before, many a time. But he’s not too worried for the other man. If Castle is like bone, he will mend. It may take months or years, but eventually he’ll knit together again; the pain will lessen. There will probably be an ache left on cold, lonely days, but he’ll mend.  </p>
<p>Bone might be breakable, if you hit it at the right place, but it’s stronger than steel, in the end, and that sums up Frank Castle.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Get too close to Matt Murdock, Frank muses as he lowers his rifle and steps away from the rooftop, and you get burned.</p>
<p>He’s had an idea for a while that there was more to the lawyer than he seemed, but it wasn’t until tonight, when the Daredevil mask came off and Murdock’s face was clear in the sniper sight, that Frank has been sure.</p>
<p>The girl is the latest victim of whatever fire Murdock carries within him. Frank’s got no idea who she is – was – but she was a hell of a fighter, and still she’s been defeated. She let herself be defeated, to save Murdock.</p>
<p>Murdock’s fire is heat, and passion, and blistering power behind the fists. Frank’s felt the flames, he’s been singed himself, but not engulfed the way this girl has, the way Franklin Nelson and Karen Page have.</p>
<p>Yet there’s something enticing too about Murdock. You want to get closer to his heat, feel the warmth in his smile, when he smiles. His fire is irresistible. Frank knows he should step away, but he’s not sure he can.  </p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>